HERE'S TO YOU THURSDAY

You better sit down for this. I decided a couple of days ago that I really wanted to do my regular Thursday post. If you fell down, it is your own fault. I suggested that you sit. I know. I am really shocked, too. The feeling just came over me. If you don't know what I am talking about, that only shows how long it has been. A long dog-gone time. Anyway, what is a Thursday post you say?

Well... it used to be a weekly event. Something to be anticipated with relish and excitement. Seriously. I anticipated it that way. It went a lot like this one is going to roll out. Only every Thursday.

Here is the explanation: Today is the day that I celebrate all of the amazingness that you contributed to blogland this week. It is that day again. What day is that you ask? How can you have forgotten? Drum roll please. It is HERE'S TO YOU THURSDAY, of course! The very best day of the blogging week. It is the precursor to the best day of the work week.

Here is what is going down: this is a weekly event. (As I said, it used to be a weekly event.) The best (or worst) part is that I am not going to explain why I chose "whatever" footage for each of you. If, you watch your footage and are scratching your head at the end, well that means I didn't do a very good job. However, all is not lost. You can email me at rarichards68@gmail.com and ask me what I was thinking when I chose that particular piece of footage off of youtube and connected it to you. And then I will tell you. Then I will start sending up prayers that I haven't offended the crap out of whoever is on the receiving end of that email....lol. Because, honestly, I will tell you right now... I admire all of you enormously so I really hope that doesn't happen.

Also, this is not an exclusive venture by any means. I hope that you will take the time to watch ALL of the footage because I don't pick bad footage:-) I also hope that you might check out the blog of the person I dedicated the footage to because they are pretty darn awesome. If you haven't figured this out yet... I pick the footage based on something that you've written or something that I've gleaned from your personality. Think on that for a while... If you are having trouble watching the entire video (meaning it is being cut off on one side), click on it a couple of times and it will take you straight over to youtube. If you click on the four squares at the bottom corner of the video, it will enlarge it to fill your screen. The escape key will bring it back to normal size. The back arrow will bring you back to my page.

Now, let's get this PARTY STARTED!!!!

This one is for everyone:

Now this particular piece of flash mob action happened right here in my hometown and I missed it. Fortunately, other people were there and it made youtube. I think it is totally awesome.





This one is for Chris at A Deliberate Life:





This one is for Shoes at Red Shoe's Chronicles:





This one is for The Factory Girl:





This one is for Quilting Ranny:





This one is for Empty Nester at Empty Nest:





This one is for Phoenix at Res ipsa loquitor:





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I love all of you big-time and have missed you. I am really trying to get back to me. I think of this clip from Grey's Anatomy. It sort of applies. Sadly, I couldn't find it on youtube. WTF? Anyway... it was in Season 2 and Derek had broken things off with Meredith to give things another go with Addison, because he felt like that was the right thing to do. However, he was in love with Meredith and she with him. It felt a lot like death, I suppose. Heartbreak is heartbreak, after all. Anyhow, they went through all of the stages of death. Denial. Grief. Etc. At one point, in my favorite episode (okay, one of my faves), IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT, Meredith asks him, "How do you go on?"

I am not sure that she said it quite like that because I don't have the clip. But I know that he said, "You just have to wait for it to pass." She just did that nod thing and went on her way. I guess she knew she would be waiting a long time. And he stood there and watched her walk away. The look on his face indicated he knew he would also be waiting a long time.

Addison walks up to him and says, "What are you doing?"

He responds, "Waiting for it to pass."

And I share this with you because I am waiting for it to pass. In my next post I will tell you about my most recent dream that I had about my dad. It was cool and it freaked me out all at the same time. That is a new one for me.

P IS FOR POOL

Given the time of year, I would like to say that this post is going to be all about this kind of pool:

image found here

However, that is not the case. You have to watch this clip from one of my all-time favorite movies (and musicals) to get where this post is going. It is from THE MUSIC MAN starring Robert Preston. I cannot tell you how many times I have watched it, though not recently. Anyway, this is one of my favorite scenes for oh so many reasons.

Oh, we got trouble right here in River City, with a capital T, that rhymes with P, and stands for Pool. Masstyria. Friends, the idle brain is the devil's playground.

And my personal favorite is at the very beginning: River City isn't in any trouble. Well, then we have to create some.

And so it goes.

I have had several conversations on a variety of topics in recent days that all lead back to the same thing. People create trouble to get what they want. You can have a perfectly wonderful system in place and someone will come along and abuse it. Why? Because they can. Because they are manipulative, lazy, scheming, etc. There are a whole host of reasons.

The thing is this: you cannot change it. For instance, there will always be people trying to get Social Security Disability who can work. There will be people who get Disability who couldn't work, but then can work, but choose not to go back to work. Or they go back to work under the table and continue to get the Disability money while working. If you allow your brain to dwell on these things, you stay fixed in the land of negativity. That is not a good place to live.

One of my Facebook friends, who I don't really know, posted something in her status the other day about appreciation. She said that the more she appreciates each thing in her life, the more things there are to appreciate. That was a bit of a jolt for me. I knew that already, but I wasn't doing it. I wasn't feeling appreciative. I was still feeling mostly pissed that my dad didn't live the 6-9 months that they gave him. He only stuck around for three. I wanted more time and I wasn't appreciating the fact that he left me so soon. In fact, I was still pretty upset about it. We are having thunderstorms almost every day and that gives me killer migraines. Not appreciating that so much. My cycle has been coming every two weeks since February. Really not appreciating that. My hormonal imbalance is tipped all the way over. Can we say that the migraines are just killing me? So, yeah, my appreciation levels have been LOW.

However, when I read that status, I remembered that negative builds on negative and positive builds on positive. I can keep my focus on everything I just wrote that I am really not happy about, or I can find one thing each day that pleases me, and think on that. And think on it and think on it and think on it. And if that is the only thing I have, I stick with it. Maybe it is just listening to songs that make me happy. Or watching MY NAME IS EARL because it makes me laugh and laugh and laugh. Or playing with my dog. Or reading a good book. Honestly, it doesn't matter what it is so long as it is positive.

Remember, my friends, listen to me, because I pass this way but once!

Pastel in a Brilliant Life

This has been the strangest time. Seriously. My creativity has been in the crapper. My hormones are raging out of control and so are my migraines. So I basically feel lousy all of the time. I remember reading years ago in my book on severe adrenal fatigue that all it takes is a major crisis to knock you right on your butt and completely drain your reserves. For someone who has no reserves, that really messes you up. It helps you discover problems you didn't know you had. Like you needed that, right?

Anyway, you probably noticed my lack of blogging, reading, and commenting. My focus is still lousy. I have considered posting one of those "I'm taking a break" blogs, but that feels like quitting and I don't want to do that just yet. Matter of fact, I almost had a Thursday post a couple of weeks ago. I had several things jotted down, but it just never came to fruition. This is what I mean about my inability to focus.

I have also started writing a book about my health experience, which includes my dad's adrenal breakdown when I was a kid, and might end up including other people's health issues if I was really involved in them. The book is all about how I fell through the floor (lost everything) and is written from the perspective of a regular person. Not a medical journal. Not a doctor. I am not out to sell anything, tell you one way is better than another, etc. This is just my story and my goal is to share it and possibly help someone else from falling through the floor. My secondary goal is to use it to launch my Forging Hope Project. Yeah, it all circles back to being an instrument to help other people. The mission is to assist other people in their journey from illness to wellness.

In other news, I got a military ID card. My stepdad is retired military and we jumped through those hoops to prove that my medical problems today date back to before I was 21 y/o. Yeah, that was fun. While I was in Ohio dealing with my dad while he was still alive I was also calling all of my former doctors digging up any and all paperwork from my childhood. Anyway, we found some. On this one application with symptoms it said in my own hand (I was 13): headaches, nausea, aching in bones and muscles. That was a bit of a shock to read. Anyway, we gave it all to my current doctor to read over. She then submitted a letter to state that she believed that the roots of my current problems began in youth. It was clear that it did. She did. So, after the military sent back the letter saying that it needed to be rewritten in their format (and it was), I was quickly approved.

This means that I cancelled my old insurance (which sucked). I am now on Tricare and am part of my parents' plan. My Rxs are cheap. Yay. I am on a copay system. I can actually get testing and stuff done. Anything done at the base hospital will be free (I think) or very inexpensive. In other words, I can actually get some forward momentum on getting some of my health issues solved. This is such a blessing.

I am now in the third phase of SSD approval. This is when I am most likely to get approved. For my area, we are looking at about 10 months before it comes before the judge. That is how slowly the system is working. Some places it is as long as three years. So, I will keep my tongue in my mouth and not complain. When you win, they backpay you in one lump sum. The irony will be if they take so long that I will be able to work by the time they get to my case. That, of course, will be thanks to the military insurance assistance. I will have financially broken my parents since 2006 and I will just be getting well by the time my case comes up. lol.

I am not sure what I think about that.

I have been watching MY NAME IS EARL on DVD. It is hilarious. It is about this bad dude who wins a scratch off lottery ticket and immediately gets hit by a car. In the hospital he sees Carson Daly on TV talking karma. He says that he thinks he has this good life because he believes if you do good things, good things come back to you. Well, that is when Earl make his list of every bad thing he has ever done. He is certain karma is out to get him. He has to fix things or karma is going to kill him. While he is doing the first good thing, he finds his winning scratch off. The rest of the show is him doing the things on his list. H-i-l-a-r-i-o-u-s.

That cracks me up.

I try to laugh a little every day.

I guess that is all I have for now. Oh... I did get an IPod at long last. Love it. Still not real sure what I am doing. It has face chat on it. But I have no idea how to work it and don't know anyone else who has face chat. Now *that* is funny.

I hope that you have found something here to entertain, inform, or in some other way enlighten you. I do try to please.


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